River Cruise 2015 - May 1 - Antwerp, Belgium, walking tour

At 9 a.m., we began a walking tour of Antwerp, then were later turned loose to be on our own.  There was much to see and hear about, and some of it I even remember!

At first I thought this was Brabo, who we will meet later, but apparently, he is just a giant that showed up in a story book at some point.  The building behind was built in stages, some of it was "old" and some of it "ancient" - too bad I can't remember the whole story.  :-) 

This area of the city is just full of beautiful old buildings - well some old, some built to look old.  The war destroyed a lot of amazing stuff!  So sad! 

 
This is a side of the first building - I THINK the right is the "old", and the left is the "ancient".  It was cool to walk through it. 

This lovely old train station seems to be used for boat storage and repair, and is going to be restored, I believe. 

This obviously used to be a fish market. 

This fountain is in the Grote Markt, with the spire of the Cathedral of Our Lady behind it.  I'll show more of these later. 

This is an amazing cathedral - I am so glad it was not bombed during the wars! 

Another shot of the Cathedral of Our Lady. 

And here's Brabo - at the top of the fountain.
Antwerp means "hand throwing".  The story is that a Mythical Roman soldier called Brabo killed a giant called Druon Antigoon, cut off his hand, and threw it over the city and into the river.  Druon was said to have asked for money from everyone who crossed over the bridge over the Scheldt River, and if they couldn't or wouldn't pay him, he cut off their hand.  Brabo became a hero. 

And here is Druon at the base of the fountain, minus a hand.

    

 This scene depicts some of the workers who were working on the cathedral, which was built from 1351 to 1521 - guess they had a lot of different workers over those years! 

There are a great many beautiful stained glass windows in the Cathedral of our Lady! 

There are also dozens of huge paintings in the cathedral, all done by the famous painter Peter Paul Rubens, who lived most of his life in Antwerp.  This is one of my favorites, depicting Jesus with the children. 

I believe this would be the coffin of a priest, but apparently in those early days, if you were very rich, you were able to be buried under the floor of the cathedral.  As your body rotted, it became very smelly, and that's where the saying about the "stinking rich" came from.  There were a lot of people buried under the floor, but eventually, they decided it would only be priests who were buried there. 

This is a model of the cathedral, and you can see that there is a whole lot more to it than in my pictures! 

We were taken on a walk through some very narrow streets and alleys where people lived - it was so cool! 

Like this one! And of course, always the streets were cobblestones!  Why don't we do that?  They last forever!

This little narrow alley actually had tables for the restaurant on the left.  The lady on the right, Patricia, here with her daughter Brenda, did a part of the Camino de Santiago Trail a few years ago on her own.  I was so impressed with this lady!  This is her Camino website if you are interested in having a look:
 https://www.pinterest.com/pin/112027109457418400/ 

The scallop shell is a symbol and a guide along the many miles of the Camino Trails, and Pat spotted one in Antwerp as we were walking with the guide.  Good eye, Pat! 

.....until next time....